weasel the next. She was racked by loud, spasmodic sobs. The tip of the bayonet was nearly buried in Little Auntie’s mouth. A rush of concern for her young and a total disregard for her own well-being snapped her back to her senses. She quickly took off her pants, her underpants, and her shirt, then lay back and said resolutely, ‘Come on, come on and do it! But don’t touch my child! Don’t you touch my child!’
The Japanese soldier on the kang withdrew his bayonet and dropped his weary arms. Second Grandma lay there, her naked body the burnt, aromatic colour of fried sorghum. A radiant, almost magical ray of sunlight shone between her legs, as though illuminating an ancient, beautiful myth or legend, a fairy grotto, the kindly yet majestic eye of God. As the Japanese gazed at the path through which all mankind must pass, at the same organ possessed by their own loved ones, their eyes glazed over and their faces hardened, like six clay statues. Second Grandma waited for them, her mind a grey void.
I sometimes wonder if Second Grandma might have avoided being ravaged if it had only been one Japanese soldier facing her splendid naked body that day. I doubt it, for a sole virile beast in human form, freed of the need to act like a performing monkey, might have been even more frenzied, shedding his handsomely embroidered uniform and pouncing on her like a wild animal. Under normal circumstances, it is the power of morality that keeps the beast in us hidden beneath a pretty exterior. A stable, peaceful society is the training ground for humanity, just as caged animals, removed from the violent unpredictability of the wild, are influenced by the behaviour of their captors in time. Do you agree? Yes? No? Well, say it, yes or no? If I weren’t a man myself, and if I were holding the sword of vengeance in my hand, I’d slaughter every last man on earth! If there had been just one Japanese soldier facing Second Grandma’s naked body that day, maybe he would have thought of his mother or his wife, and left quietly. What do you think?
The six soldiers didn’t budge. They were gazing upon Second Grandma’s naked body as though it were a sacrificial offering. None was willing to leave; none dared to. She lay outstretched like a huge dogfish baking under a blazing sun. Little Auntie’s voice was hoarse from all her crying, the sound growing weaker, the intervals longer. The once animated soldiers had been subdued by Second Grandma’s offering up of her body, her stretching out on the kang like a loving mother in front of her sons, each of whom was thinking about the path he had travelled.
I believe that if Second Grandma had been able to hold out just a bit longer she might have achieved victory. Second Grandma, why, after lying there like that, did you have to get up and start putting your clothes back on? You had barely managed to stick one leg into your pants when the Japanese soldiers began to get restless. The one you’d bitten on the nose threw down his rifle and climbed onto the kang, and as you looked at him in disgust, your derangement took over. Then the skinny Jap who had found the way to subdue you jumped up and kicked his fat buddy away, swinging his fists and growling at his buddies in a language you didn’t understand. Then, before you knew it, he was on top of you, gasping like a rooster and breathing foul air into your face.
The black-mouthed weasel flashed before your eyes, and once again you shrieked madly. But you only stimulated the madness of the Japanese soldiers; your shrieks were met by a concert of shrieks from them.
It was the balding, middle-aged soldier who dragged the skinny one off you. Then he pressed his savage face up to yours, and you closed your eyes in revulsion. You thought you could feel your three-month-old foetus writhing in your belly, and could hear the desperate screeches of Little Auntie, like a rusty knife being drawn across a whetstone. The balding Jap chewed on your face with his daggerlike teeth, as though he wanted to pay you back for biting his nose. Your face was covered with tears, fresh blood, and his thick, sticky slobber. Hot red blood suddenly gushed from your mouth, and a vile stench filled your nostrils. The squirming foetus in your belly produced waves of liver-rending, lung-filling pain; every muscle, every nerve in your body tensed and knotted up, like so many bowstrings. The foetus seemed to be burrowing into some deep recess of your body to hide from a shame that could never be washed away. Anger festered in your heart, and when the Japanese soldier’s greasy cheeks brushed up against your lips you made a feeble attempt to bite his face. His skin was tough and rubbery and had a sour taste.
The last one to mount Second Grandma was a short young soldier. Only shame showed on his face, and his lovely eyes were filled with the panic of a hunted rabbit. His body smelled like artemisia; the silvery glint of his teeth shone between trembling, fleshy red lips. Second Grandma felt a rush of pity for him, as she recognised his tortured look of self-loathing and shame under a thin layer of beaded sweat. He rubbed against her body at first, but then stopped and didn’t dare move any more. She felt his belt buckle press up against her belly and his body quake.
The soldiers around the kang roared with laughter and shouted derisively at this impotent young soldier. Having got his second wind, the skinny one jumped up onto the kang, jerked the young soldier away roughly, and flaunted his own abilities without a trace of shame or embarrassment, making a grand display. Second Grandma felt dead below the neck. Something yellow spun around in her brain, yellow and elliptical.
Afterwards, way off in the distance, she heard Little Auntie let out a blood-curdling scream. Struggling to open her eyes, she could not believe what she saw. The young soldier with the lovely eyes stood on the kang and lifted Little Auntie on the point of his bayonet, swung her in a couple of arcs, then flung her away. Like a huge bird flapping its wings, she sailed slowly through the air and landed on the floor next to the kang. Her little red jacket fell open in the sunlight and began to spread out like a piece of soft, smooth red silk, gradually filling the room with undulating waves.
During her flight, Little Auntie’s arms froze in the air and her hair stood up like porcupine quills. The young Japanese soldier, rifle in hand, wept clear blue tears.
Second Grandma screamed for all she was worth and strained to sit up. But her body was dead by then. A wave of yellow flashed before her eyes, followed by a green light. Finally, she was swallowed up by an inky-black tide.
Swing your sabres at the heads of Japs!
The sorghum is red, the Japs come from the east.
Trampling our soil and disgracing my second grandma.
Patriotic brethren everywhere, the day of resistance is now!
5
GRANDDAD ARRIVED IN Saltwater Gap the following morning. He had set out before dawn on one of our two black mules, and arrived just as the sun was climbing above the mountains. Dejection accompanied him on his trip, because of an argument he’d had with Grandma as he was leaving. He ignored the kaleidoscope of gorgeous light on the black Gaomi soil as the sun rose above the mountains, and the crows as they soared into the sky on green wings. The mule, whipped mercilessly by the twisted end of the hempen reins, turned to glare at the man on its back, convinced that it was already moving about as fast as it could go. Puddles of water from the autumn rains stood in the deep ruts left by passing wagons. Granddad, his face livid, passively absorbed the bumps and jolts of the mule beneath him. Field voles hunting for breakfast scurried to safety.
Granddad was toasting the ageing Uncle Arhat in the distillery reception hall when he heard rifle and artillery fire from the northwest, and his heart nearly stopped. He rushed outside and looked up and down the street, but when he saw that things seemed normal he went back inside to continue drinking with Uncle Arhat, who was still the distillery foreman. In 1929, the year Granddad was reported murdered and Grandma ran off, the hired hands rolled up their bedding and set out to find work; but Uncle Arhat stayed behind, like a loyal watchdog, to guard the family property, convinced that the dark night was nearly over and that a new dawn would soon be breaking. He maintained his vigil until Granddad cheated death, escaped from prison, and was reconciled with Grandma. With Father in her arms, she followed him from Saltwater Gap back home, where they knocked at the cheerless front gate and roused Uncle Arhat, who, like a living ghost, rushed out of the shed where he’d set up housekeeping. The moment he spotted his master and mistress, he threw himself to the ground, hot tears streaking his leathery old face. He was such a decent, devoted man that Granddad and Grandma treated him like their own father, giving him a free hand in all distillery-related matters, including expenses, no matter how high they ran; they never once questioned him.
The sun was high in the southeast sky when more bursts of rifle fire erupted, and Granddad knew it was coming from somewhere near Saltwater Gap, perhaps from the village itself. Anxious and impatient, he went to get the mule to set out right away, but Uncle Arhat urged him to wait. Uncle Arhat made sense, but Granddad was too restless to stay put, walking in and out of the building as he waited for news from the hired hand Uncle Arhat had
